Conventional approaches for cardiac valve replacement require the cutting of a relatively large opening in the patient's sternum (“sternotomy”) or thoracic cavity (“thoracotomy”) in order to allow the surgeon to access the patient's heart. Additionally, these approaches require arrest of the patient's heart and a cardiopulmonary bypass (i.e., use of a heart-lung bypass machine to oxygenate and circulate the patient's blood). In recent years, efforts have been made to establish a less invasive cardiac valve replacement procedure, by delivering and implanting a cardiac replacement valve via a catheter percutaneously (i.e., through the skin) via either a transvascular approach—delivering the new valve through the femoral artery, or by transapical route, where the replacement valve is delivered between ribs and directly through the wall of the heart to the implantation site.
While less invasive and arguably less complicated, percutaneous heart valve replacement therapies (PHVT) still have various shortcomings, including the inability for a surgeon to ensure proper positioning and stability of the replacement valve within the patient's body. Specifically, if the replacement valve is not placed in the proper position relative to the implantation site, it can lead to poor functioning of the valve. For example, in an aortic valve replacement, if the replacement valve is placed too high, it can lead to valve regurgitation, instability, valve prolapse and/or coronary occlusion. If the valve is placed too low, it can also lead to regurgitation and mitral valve interaction.
To address such risks, recapture procedures and systems have been developed. For example, such a system is disclosed in U.S. publication no. 20050137688 and U.S. Pat. No. 5,957.949, each disclosure of which is herein incorporated by reference. While such systems may address the problem of improper placement, they are somewhat complicated, requiring the use of wires which are removable attached to an end of the stent to pull the stent back into the delivery catheter.
Throughout this description, including the foregoing description of related art, any and all publicly available documents described herein, including any and all U.S. patents, are specifically incorporated by reference herein in their entirety. The foregoing description of related art is not intended in any way as an admission that any of the documents described therein, including pending United States patent applications, are prior art to embodiments according to the present disclosure. Moreover, the description herein of any disadvantages associated with the described products, methods, and/or apparatus, is not intended to limit inventions disclosed herein. Indeed, aspects of the disclosed embodiments may include certain features of the described products, methods, and/or apparatus without suffering from their described disadvantages.